Too little too late. This shoddy outfit has nailed its balls to the mast and stated quite categorically where it stands on gay marriage. For it to change gear at this late stage in the face of overwhelming hostility smacks of utter desperation, and no one in their right mind believes that any effort they put into campaigning for gay marriage will be wholehearted. Stonewall your time is up. Go straight to the benefit office. Don’t pass GO. Pink News we salute you for exposing these pseudo-gay rights campaigners for the Whitehall bum-licking charlatans they really are…

Yay about time; fingers crossed they can get this sorted in the next few years just in time for me to get my GRC; and this will mean I can still stay married rather then annul our 12 year marriage and have a CP.

Lets nope they put proper effort into this, and not

SW: ‘Will you allow same sex couples to marry and have the same rights as hetro couples?’
Parliment: No.
SW: ‘Ok then, sorry’

Maybe they’ve been embarassed by Peter Tatchell’s (Outrage) Equal Love campaign which is set to take legal action against sexual apartheid.
There now in direct competition with an other gay rights group which is more in tune with the public mood!

I wonder whether Stonewall are trying to calm things down after recent events (and didn’t want another demo at the awards next week). That said, it may just be my interpretation, but the wording to me sounds like a compromise still on proper marriage equality?

“We seek to secure marriage for gay people as a civil vehicle on the same basis as heterosexual marriage, available in a registry office but without a mandate on religious organisations to celebrate it.”

I want to be nice, it’s great they’ve climbed down. But… this isn’t equality. It’s a half-hearted public relations exercise. Why no religious marriage? Are LGBT people not allowed religious marriages in supportive religious organisations? And the suggestion that civil partnerships are “special” and “unique” stinks of the same sort of language used to deny us marriage by religious fundies.

They’ve wasted 5 years sitting on the fence on this vital issue to there needs to be immediate actiom from Stonewall to try to repair the massive damage they have done to their reputation and the campaign for LGBT equality.

Some questions that have not been answered:

1. What are Stonewall’s immediate, short term and medium term plans to achieve marriage equality.

2. Is Ben Summerskill going to be replaced as head of Stonewall (or at least offer a full apology for his despicable behaviour at the Lib Dem party conference)

3. Has Stonewall given any guarantees that they will NEVER again pretend to speak for the LGBT population on ANY issue without 1st consulting a sample number of the LGBT community.

4. Has Stonewall offered any clarificationn as to who decides their agenda and to whom they are answerable.

I really want to believe that they have changed.

If they are serious about campaigning for full equality then I’d like to see answers to my questions above.

Otheewise I feel people may suspect that the ONLY reason Stonewall has come out in favour of equality is for PR purposes thanks to the horrific damage Summerskill inflicted on Stonewall’s reputation, credibility and influence.

At last! Stonewall was made to do a ‘U’ turn. We have written to our Conservative MP on this issue. For full Equality we must campaign for Same-Sex Marriage Equality. The Civil Partnership certificate is worthless as we have since found out, especially in the NHS, and is not applicable outside the UK anyway.

“We seek to retain civil partnerships for lesbian and gay people recognising their special and unique status.”

– umm not so equal sounding really – watch the small print !
we ain’t special ! same same but different
u can’t argue for equality IF you also argue to be special – is this a way out to avoid backing str8 access to civil partnerships ? – if so – why ?

Now lets see how far up the agenda marriage equality goes. Last time I checked, it was number 8. It should be number 1 and now! I’m very disappointed Summerskill has not included civil partnerships for straight couples who want them. Aside from the pressure we’ve all put on him collectively (I’ve been doing it for four years), I think it puts StonewallUK in an awkward position where we have the Liberal Democrats endorsing marriage equality without any help from StonewallUK and Ed Miliband now supports it, again without any prodding by StonewallUK, in other words, straight people pushing for it, no thanks to StonewallUK. I suspect Summerskill has been embarrassed into supporting it. Its up to us now to make sure we hold his feet to the fire without letup. As others say, action speaks louder than words. We must be vigilant and make sure that StonewallUK vigorously pursues it.

I support Stonewall and I was consulted by them (and I happen to support gay marriage). However, I would have been affronted if all the macho, shouty and aggressive men above were being listened to more than their genuine lesbian, gay and bisexual supporters just because they’re abusive and offensive

If Stonewall want to take the national stage on LGB issues then they need to be accountable to all LGB people. They take the national stage and hover up all the funding, yet they are accountable to no one and have no mandate to represent all LGB people.

If Stonewall want to continue it should change how it operates or makes it very clear it is only representative of its 20,000 members not the LGB.

I’m reserving judgement until I see them DOING something. Yes, it’s good they’ve finally conceded that they should be supporting equal marriage, but I can’t help being suspicious about how active this campaign will be. What I don’t want is them saying one thing in public and doing another behind our backs.

Well, I’m reserving judgement until I see them DOING something. Yes, it’s good they’ve finally conceded that they should be supporting equal marriage, but I can’t help being suspicious about how active this campaign will be. What I don’t want is them saying one thing in public and doing another behind our backs.

The truth is that if the LGBT community wants marriage equality then Stonewall’s input is needed because they do hold some sway in the political world. Now that they have done the right thing people must draw a line under their past mistakes. Internecine quarrelling will only be self-destructive and we now all need to pull together to work collaboratively towards a common goal. We’ve all had a good bitch and moan about Stonewall’s shortcomings but now let’s appreciate the fact that the will have an important role to play in fighting this battle. Attacking them will not help us to win that battle.

I can’t understand Stonewall’s position on this. The issue of allowing same sex marriage can be summed up in one word – equality. Either Stonewall believes that gay people are entitled to equal treatment, or they don’t. For them not to support it really undermines their whole purpose for existing.

Great news! Thanks PN and others and thanks to all those that were going to go to that demo.

If they’re not supporting straights CPs then I guess there will be no need for them to do any further reasearch and costing into this aspect of any party’s proposals for CP and marriage equality change.

Concentrate on marriage equality and let Lord Lester and others sort out the CP aspect or better still why not delay doing anything with CPs until marriage equality has been sorted out. Why cloud the issue of marriage equality with the possible complicated aspects of what to do with CPs….

We have a totally useless law called CPs which give us nothing new apart from segration , a copy of what we should have had in the first place , marriage. Come up with a more useful alternative lifestyle for all….

I think several commentators misunderstand “mandate” in Stonewall’s statement. Stonewall appears to be saying that religious organizations shouldn’t be *compelled* to offer gay marriages; but that does not rule out their being free to do so if they want to. Admittedly, “mandate” is an odd word to use here and sounds like a bit of jargon having only a distant relation to ordinary English.

I wonder whether Stonewall’s dragging its feet over gay marriage has been to some extent a generational thing. Twenty or thirty years ago debates among LGB activists tended to be dominated by those who claimed that marriage was an oppressive institution that, especially, worked against the interests of women and gays. I suspect that the people now in the driving seat of Stonewall were brought up on this idea and the demands of the younger generation for marriage pure and simple have rather wrong-footed them. (To explain, by the way, is not to justify or excuse.)

@ David 20/10 16:22 – regarding your comments about Stonewall not supporting extending harassment protection to gay people in the Equality Act. The reason for this is because the protection is not requried becasue protection from discrimination (which is in the act) covers all bases. Can you truely think of any type of harassment of gay people that isn’t also discrimination (for which their is protection)? BTW – to help you discrimination means treating one person less favourably than another person because of their protected characteristic. There is no point in having a law that is useless and would never be used.

@ David – “Has Stonewall given any guarantees that they will NEVER again pretend to speak for the LGBT population on ANY issue without 1st consulting a sample number of the LGBT community.” The whole reason why Stonewall didn’t come immediately out with a statement supporting “gay marriage” is EXACTLY because they were waiting for the results of their survey of their 20,000 supporters. Would you rather they’d just made the statement without checking with anyone first? No, I thought not.

@ Bill Perdue 20:33 – “Could it be that the sudden change of policy has resulted from an equally sudden decline in income…” No, the announcement of their position has resulted from the survey of their supporters now being completed, so they are able to announce their position based on the wishes of its supporters.

Also, if you read Stonewall’s position on “gay marriage” it articulates some of the nuances in the issue – It explains their position on religious marriage, it explains their position on Civil Partnership – This is much more useful to the Government that just saying “we want marriage equality”, becasue that clearly means different things to different people (as evidenced by all the posts above!)

“The whole reason why Stonewall didn’t come immediately out with a statement supporting “gay marriage” is EXACTLY because they were waiting for the results of their survey of their 20,000 supporters. Would you rather they’d just made the statement without checking with anyone first? No, I thought not.”

So groups that are supposed to represent LGBT equality have to rely on a handful of the community to decide if they actually want equality, whilst the rest of us, the majority who have openly called for support for equal marriage have to wait on them deciding if we’re worth it? What nonsense. They’re either for equality or they’re not!

The job of Equality groups is to ensure that we all have equality NOT to pick and chose what equality we have. They should be fighting for equal marriage and it is for us as individuals who should have the right to decide to marry or not. They have NO right to take that decision for us. They are not the majority.

Equality Rights should never be questioned nor held on a vote, they should be automatic and for all. Stonewall should Never have to have this explained. The fight for equality should be Until we have total equality. I do not appreciate them taking a ‘vote’ to see if we’re worth it.

Stonewall are out of touch and out of date. Unless they back there talk with positive action they are in danger of being too late to recover from the damaged reputation they have caused.

Stonewall have now stated their policy (decided after surveying a statistically significant poputlation of LGB people) which favours “gay-marriage” and the retention of Civil Partnerships. They have an active engagement process with hundreds of businesses to ensure that they embed LGB equality in the workplace. They are actively campaigning to eradicate homophobic bullying in school. Last week they produced guidance for gay men on adopting children. They provide advice and guidance to LGB people on a range of issues from immigration, asylum, hate crime, domestic violence, criminal law, discrimination in goods and services, health, housing, workplace discrimination… and it goes on and on and on…

@ Stephen Kay – read the above, consider what other organisations there are out there that do this level of work on that scale, and then re-consider your assertion that Stonewall don’t represent the interests of LGB people.

Oh really Paul? You ain’t seen nothing yet. Stonewall is not a leopard that can change its spots to suit its pocket. They have been exposed for the charlatans they really are and the fact they do not represent the LGBT community. This is only the beginning…

Wait until the LGBT Community find out they have been supporting a London AIDS Charity that in 2004 after their HIV Low Paid Staff who happened to be a Police Panel Member ! requested from the Trustees a contract of employment was e-mailed …..

Crusaid Head of Dept Charity e-mail to HIV Police Panel Member…..
“pendantic,uncooperative and causing stress hassle and pain to alot of people” …..If Crusaid is so bad get another Job with a better employer”

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